MICHAEL Watson was left with mixed emotions after suffering play-off heartache at the end of the Glenmuir PGA Professional Championships at the Belfry.

The Wessex Golf Centre professional scooped £1,925 for finishing tied sixth but then failed to make the cut for the Great Britain & Ireland PGA Cup team after taking to the course once again in a five-way shootout for the remaining two berths at the end of the event.

Speaking to Echosport, Watson said: “It was a great week but by the end of it I was left with mixed emotions.

“To finish sixth was a good result and had it only been about the tournament itself I would have been delighted but I really wanted to get into the PGA Cup team and enjoy a week in America in September, so to get so close and miss out was very disappointing.

“The chance to represent your country doesn’t come along very often but I will certainly be back in two years’ time to go for it again and hopefully on that occasion I will make it.”

At the end of day two, Watson was at the top of the leaderboard, having recorded a second round six-under-par 66, but he was unable to maintain that form over the next 36 holes in changing conditions and was left to rue missed opportunities on the green come the end of the tournament.

He added: “I hit a couple of loose shots at the start of the third round and did not get away with them but I got myself back into contention and went into the final round feeling confident.

“It was very windy on the last day but after dropping shots on the sixth and seventh I once again managed to turn things around, only to then miss a couple of short putts for par on the 15th and 17th.

“I then missed a 12-footer for birdie on the last that would have got me straight into the team and ended up having to go into a play-off against four other players for the last two spots where I hit the best tee shot but failed to get a birdie whereas three of them did.”

Watson’s Wessex Golf Centre colleague Jon Bevan, who represented GB&I in Georgia the last time they took on the Americans on their own soil four years ago, failed to make the cut at the halfway stage of the event.

Bevan was left languishing on 10-over at the end of the first two rounds but Watson has tipped his close friend to bounce back.

He said: “Jon struggled a little bit last week and although we are both disappointed we will certainly be back, gunning to make the team in the future.

“There are still plenty of Pro-Ams and order of merit events coming up so we will now turn our focus to them, and look to produce some good results over the summer.”